He went away from there and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. And on the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands? Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.” And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. And he marveled because of their unbelief. (Mark 6:1-6)
Since childhood, I have had to question whether things people believe have substance. A quiet Christian mom and an angry agnostic dad gave me plenty of practice in listening for the reasons people believed what they did.
So many decades later, I continue to marvel at how people react to Jesus’ claims. I listen for substance but hear only emotional opinion. Even so-called science is saturated by words, emotions, and opinions rather than substance that can be tested, observed, repeated, and falsified.
What I saw when Jesus went back to his hometown was what I now understand as childish pride. I have seen it in two-year-olds, that idea that what they think they know is the whole sum of knowledge in the whole wide world. It’s even worse in the hormonal years of the teens when young folk imagine they have attained far more knowledge than their parents or elders and their way of seeing things is the only way they can be. When we find the same thing in older people who are still at the toddler and teen levels of maturity (or immaturity), it is almost impossible to convince them that there is a view of Jesus that has far more substance than their own.
When I first noticed how often Jesus contrasted the “many” with the “few”, I thought of the “many” being worldlings and the “few” being true believers in Jesus Christ. But then I realized that Jesus kept applying the “many” to religious people. Church folk. They first stood out as religious Jews who were blind to who he was as their Messiah. But then I realized that Jesus spoke of a time when “many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another” (Matthew 24:10), meaning, church people. People who put on a show of attending church but without ever experiencing the transforming power of the gospel.
Why does this encourage me? Because if that is the way it is, it puts my heart and mind to rest to know that Jesus called it (commonly referred to as “prophesied”). He even said, “On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’” (Matthew 7:22), referring to a characteristic of the judgment when many people who were active in churches, even doing things we would call miracles, will discover that Jesus didn’t even know them in the personal relationship the church should be known for.
And why would I want everyone who reads this to know that Jesus does not necessarily approve of every church we might attend (or have attended)? Because our response to Jesus is just that, OUR response, not someone else’s. I would rather be among the few who are humbly living by faith in Jesus Christ than the many who are in love with themselves, their churches, their denominations, their doctrines, their church friends, and/or their religious family heritage, but would be among the easily-offended if Jesus actually did something in their church groups.
Jesus calls you and I to him. Simple as that. His word is full of the evidences of his words and his work. Testing ourselves every day to be sure our faith is in him and the new covenant in his blood and not in anything we are doing for him, helps us to know what only a few experience, that “the righteous shall live by faith” no matter how few or many we appear to be.
© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)
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